Euthanasia

News about euthanasia and assisted suicide, including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times.

Chronology of Coverage

Mar. 24, 2015

Letter from radio host Diane Rehm comments on March 23 letter written in response to March 15 editorial about allowing terminally ill patients option for ending their lives. MORE

Mar. 15, 2015

Editorial praises radio host Diane Rehm for being powerful voice advocating for right-to-die movement and helping terminally ill patients obtain the option for ending their lives; notes states across the country are debating options, and only handful allow practice; urges lawmakers to learn from example of Oregon, which has crafted responsible law governing practice. MORE

Feb. 12, 2015

Lawsuit filed in San Francisco Superior Court by a cancer patient and five doctors seeks exemption from California's ban on assisted suicide for doctors who help terminally ill patient end their lives. MORE

Feb. 7, 2015

Canada's Supreme Court strikes down laws banning physician-assisted suicide for patients with incurable medical conditions; decision comes during time of intense debate about assisted suicides. MORE

Feb. 4, 2015

Lawsuit filed in New York State Supreme Court by group of physicians and terminally ill patients aims to make doctor-assisted suicide legal; current interpretation of state law allows for doctors to be charged with manslaughter in such cases. MORE

Dec. 31, 2014

Anesthesiologist Lawrence D Egbert says he plans to appeal Maryland Board of Physicians decision to revoke his medical license due to his helping six ill people commit suicide; none of the six people had terminal conditions. MORE

Nov. 4, 2014

Brittany Maynard, who became a public face for the 'death with dignity' movement in the United States after she was found to have terminal brain cancer, ends her life at her home in, Portland, Ore, at age 29; her death, from barbiturates, is confirmed by her husband who notes that in accordance with Oregon law her death certificate lists a brain tumor as the cause. MORE

Oct. 12, 2014

Ross Douthat Op-Ed column reflects on plight of Brittany Maynard, woman who moved to Oregon in order to take lethal prescription and die by suicide; charts American attitudes toward assisted suicide over course of twenty years, comparing them to attitudes toward other social issues. MORE

Sep. 30, 2014

Kenneth Minor pleads guilty to manslaughter for his role in stabbing of Long Island man Jeffrey Locker in Harlem in 2009; Locker wanted to die and had paid Minor to help him do so and make death look like a robbery; under agreement with prosecutors, Minor will serve 12 years in prison for pleading guilty to first-degree murder, and has also been charged with assisted suicide. MORE

Aug. 21, 2014

Study in Journal of Medical Ethics reports increase in number of people from other countries traveling to Switzerland to commit assisted suicide under auspices of right-to-die organizations. MORE

Aug. 19, 2014

Kenneth Minor, who has been accused of helping self-help motivational speaker Jeffrey Locker commit suicide in 2009, appears to have reached agreement with prosecutors to plead guilty to first-degree manslaughter, in return for sentence of 12 years. MORE

Aug. 1, 2014

Doctors in France have long held discretion, which might seem unthinkable to Americans, to make end-of-life choices for people in their care; they have legal right to withdraw treatment or administer care that will end a patient’s life so long as stated intent is to relieve patient’s suffering, and not to kill; still, French doctors' role as final arbiters of life and death is being increasingly challenged. MORE

Feb. 14, 2014

Belgian lawmakers approve measure that would allow euthanasia for incurably ill children enduring insufferable pain; measure, amended version of 2002 law allowing euthanasia for adults, makes Belgium first country to lift all age restrictions on legal, medically induced deaths. MORE

Feb. 12, 2014

Assisted suicide charge against Philadelphia nurse Barbara Mancini, accused of handing her terminally ill father a bottle of morphine, is dismissed after prosecutors fail to prove crime occurred. MORE

Feb. 8, 2014

Public support for the 'aid in dying' movement is growing nationwide, with five states allowing doctors to help terminally ill patients end their lives, but taboo remains in much of country; dilemma is illustrated by case of Robert Mitton, Colorado man with terminal heart disease who has been thwarted in effort to have a dignified death, though he could do so in neighboring state of New Mexico. MORE

Jan. 14, 2014

New Mexico Judge Nan G Nash rules that terminally ill residents have constitutional right to obtain 'aid in dying,' ruling that could make New Mexico the fifth state to allow doctors to prescribe fatal drug doses that suffering patients can use to end their lives. MORE

Dec. 13, 2013

Belgium becomes the first country to allow euthanasia for incurably ill children after the upper house of Parliament votes to extend to minors a 2002 law legalizing the practice for adults. MORE

Nov. 20, 2013

Financial planner Bob Goldman essay proposes 'life panels,' groups chosen in advance who would have legal authority to ensure people's requests to end their own lives, for people whose quality of life and mental capacity have deteriorated. MORE

Oct. 4, 2013

Appeals ruling on case in which defendant Kenneth Minor was convicted of assisting in suicide of Jeffrey Locker, motivational speaker and father of three from Long Island, finds trial judge erred in instructing jurors. MORE

Aug. 11, 2013

Frank Bruni Op-Ed column observes that prosecution of Barbara Mancini of Pennsylvania for aiding suicide of her aged father Joseph Yourshaw seems both imprudent and inhumane; contends fact that prosecutors did not choose to walk away from the case suggests how conflicted and inconsistent Americans can be when it comes to the business of dying. MORE

Jul. 21, 2013

Robin Marantz Henig article chronicles experiences of Peggy Battin, bioethicist who fought for right of people to end their own lives, and faced same dilemma after cycling accident left her husband a quadriplegic. MORE

May. 13, 2013

Wave of proposed and completed mergers between secular and Roman Catholic hospitals, which are barred by church doctrine from performing abortions, is prompting concerns in the left-leaning Pacific Northwest; critics say Catholic hospitals deny certain reproductive services or end-of-life care. MORE

Apr. 30, 2013

Ireland's Supreme Court rules that Marie Fleming, terminally ill woman in final stages of multiple sclerosis, does not have right to an assisted death; court rejects her argument that the decriminalization of suicide in Irish law necessarily conferred a right to die. MORE

Mar. 31, 2013

Sunday Dialogue on whether it should be legal for doctors to help end dying patients' lives. MORE

Feb. 15, 2013

Vermont State Senate gives final approval to measure that would exempt doctors from criminal or civil liability when treating terminally ill patients who choose to end their lives. MORE

Nov. 1, 2012

Op-Ed article by Ben Mattlin, journalist, author and lifelong disabled person, expresses his discomfort with assisted-suicide laws like one on ballot in Massachusetts; highlights his concern that for those who are often perceived as having quality of life that is untenable, and burdensome to others, potential for inadvertent influence toward making decision to die is worrisome. MORE

Aug. 23, 2012

Tony Nicklinson, British man suffering from so-called locked-in syndrome, dies, six days after a panel of High Court judges rejected his request for help in ending his life; Nicklinson had been refusing food since the court ruling. MORE

Aug. 12, 2012

Dr Richard Wesley is emblematic of the unexpected demographics of patients who have taken advantage of state laws allowing terminally ill patients to get a prescription for drugs that will hasten death; he has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the incurable disease that lays waste to muscles while leaving the mind intact; under Washington State’s Death With Dignity Act, his physician has given him a prescription for a lethal dose of barbiturates; he prefers to die naturally, but if it becomes protracted he plans to take the drugs. MORE

May. 8, 2012

Sharlotte Hydorn, an elderly California woman who acknowledged selling kits to help people commit suicide, is sentenced to five years probation for failing to file federal tax returns; conviction is part of plea deal she reached with federal prosecutors, who chose to prosecute her for tax evasion because they felt it was the best way to stop her. MORE

Apr. 3, 2012

Dutch pulmonologist Dr Petra de Jong heads Right to Die-NL, advocacy group in the Netherlands supporting euthanasia; organization offers mobile teams that help patients to die at home; group is at the forefront of the movement to make euthanasia widely available in the Netherlands, even as the practice remains highly controversial elsewhere. MORE

Mar. 13, 2012

British stroke victim Tony Nicklinson, paralyzed from the neck down, wins the right to seek changes in law that would enable a doctor to end his life without risking murder charges; ruling is a minor victory for advocates of euthanasia and assisted suicide, which are illegal in Great Britain. MORE

Feb. 7, 2012

Georgia Supreme Court rules that a state law outlawing the promotion of assisted suicide is unconstitutional; many on both sides of the issue say court's decision will change the course of the national debate over the practice. MORE

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